


Catalyst

by jiokra



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015), Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Amnesia, Angst, Character Study, Espionage, Force Bond (Star Wars), M/M, Mind Control, Undercover Missions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-19
Updated: 2016-11-19
Packaged: 2018-08-28 04:12:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,819
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8431384
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jiokra/pseuds/jiokra
Summary: Years have passed since Kylo was first sent on a mission by Luke to spy on the First Order. Encountering FN-2187 on Starkiller Base reminds him only of all the years he has lost.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LadyKiri](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyKiri/gifts).



Of all the black holes Kylo jumped through because his Master, his real Master, had told him to, following Snoke’s orders left him bereft, lost. The scavenger was so strong, stronger than anyone he’d met aside from his uncle, and delivering her to Snoke sickened him. Were he not under Master Luke’s orders to spy on Snoke, and were he not to play the part of Snoke’s prized apprentice, Kylo would have just gotten on the Falcon with his father and ended this endless, dehumanizing mission. Only he had been in it for so long, he’d forgotten who he was and what he stood for. But it did not seem to matter whether he was Ben or Kylo Ren. He had killed for Snoke so many times. He had become the monster his uncle had warned against.

Swinging his saber, warming up his wrist, Kylo turned toward the scavenger, sliding his thoughts in and out of place, returning back to the mission that was greater than himself. 

Blocking the path to her was the trooper, FN-2187. _Finn_ , the scavenger had called him. The last Kylo had seen of him was on Jakku. The trooper had been the singular magnetic pull of goodness in that sea of flame and death. Looking at him now, Kylo felt the pull. It was stronger, more vibrant, bursting from him. Ridden of his bloody white and black armor, the trooper was nothing but a man. Yet he glowed, free of black holes sucking away his light. 

Then he saw her, the scavenger, the _girl_ , and felt a foolish, naïve part of him wither. He hated her so much then. She was the order from Snoke, the arms FN-2187 ran into after his severance from darkness. Kylo punched out to her, the Force chucking her, crashing her against a tree. When she fell, it didn’t extinguish the light. Kylo beat his wound, but as long as FN-2187 stood there, breathing and alive, the light blinded Kylo. 

Kylo’s hand flinched, aching to pound the wound bleeding at his side, but he felt nothing, blinded by a light not even half as bright as his father’s, but it was blossoming. Kylo bit his cheek until he tasted iron, then yelled, “ _Traitor!_ ” 

It got the trooper’s attention at least, but then the trooper’s full radiance shined on Kylo, and he beat a fist against his wound, the waves of pain washing over him. 

When Kylo was first sent to train with his uncle Luke, his uncle had taken him to a small village for them to acquaint themselves with each other. Before then, Kylo had only seen his uncle sparingly on holidays. They’d talked, eaten out at cantinas often, until one evening when his uncle disappeared to take care of business. Kylo had walked around the village, having never left his home planet alone before, and stumbled across a group of girls his age swimming in a lake. It took some convincing, but eventually they persuaded him to join, and Kylo liked to think of that as the last day of his childhood. Once his uncle found him, soaked and dripping and smiling tentatively at the girls’ jokes as they came back into the village, his uncle had taken him aside without so much as a goodbye to the girls, and said, “Ben, if you want to become a Jedi, you cannot love.” 

Kylo hadn’t even liked the girls, but he’d had little bouts of emotions here and there for his classmates at home. His uncle hadn’t been angry—Uncle Luke was never angry, he never loved, he never regretted—but after digesting Luke’s utter seriousness, Kylo’s aching loneliness, he’d taken that talk to heart. And even now, under Snoke’s hand where he could love, Kylo hated his uncle more than ever, because an inane wall in Kylo disallowed him from relishing in any positive regard for a human being. 

And that was why the trooper, FN-2187— _Finn_ —had to die. 

Abandoning the First Order, Finn’s love for the galaxy—he was strong where Kylo was weak, filled a hole in Kylo that had long been empty. Kylo knew who he was. He regretted part but not the whole of his actions. But seeing Finn vibrant, soaring, alive with the _girl_ awakened something in Kylo, a part that wished he could have left the bridge with his father. 

Kylo eyed his grandfather’s lightsaber in Finn’s grasp. “That lightsaber. It belongs to me.” 

Finn glared, igniting the saber—and that was the look of the Jedi Knights of Kylo’s childhood. “Come and get it.” 

Finn held his own in battle, their sabers thrashing, sputtering against one another, but Kylo could have destroyed him with little effort. He could, but he didn’t _want_ to. Jedis had want for very little, Siths had want for too much. Kylo ached to strike a balance, and Finn, with his very existence, milked this need out of him. Kylo was torn between drawing out this fight and wearing Finn down from exhaustion. Bored of the battle, Kylo put more power into his attacks, overpowering Finn and driving his back against a tree, held down by the strength of Kylo’s saber. 

So close to the object of his endless fascination, Kylo could only stare into those dark brown eyes, face cast in glimmering blue and red light, a pretty violet. 

“If anyone,” said the trooper, panting in the exertion, “should be calling anyone a traitor, it’s me.” 

Kylo pressed his saber into him. 

“You don’t remember, do you?” 

“Remember what?” spat Kylo. 

“Snoke, he’s using you,” said the trooper, and with surmounting dread, Kylo heard it echoed in his father’s voice. “He’ll kill you when he’s done with you—or when he discovers the truth. Who told you how to read minds? Your uncle?” 

Kylo exhaled, breath ragged from frustration. “You know nothing.” 

And yet it seemed the beacon before him knew too much. _When Snoke discovers the truth._

“On Jakku, you sought me out,” said the trooper. Kylo look straight into the depths of those brown eyes, immobile. “Why do you think that?” 

“Your strength,” said Kylo, rattled, “is an illusion. I can kill you without trying—” 

“Snoke made you forget me, Ben! Search within yourself. You’ll find me. Or—us. Us, I think.” 

It wasn’t like it’d affect the battle either way, and if Kylo sought and found nothing, that would only remove reason for Kylo to hesitate in killing him. Shoving the saber further against Finn, Kylo looked within himself, finding it lessened the ache from his wound, and once he readied to overpower Finn with the saber, Kylo felt— _it_. A link. He tugged on it, curious about its existence, and a burst of light blinded Kylo. His grip on his saber loosened. Surrounded by so much light, its source feeling impossibly close, Kylo felt, for the first time in perhaps his whole life, at peace. 

“You’ve tricked me,” he said, gripping his lightsaber and driving it against Finn. “The girl did this.” 

Finn shoved his saber against Kylo’s. “It happened a long time ago, Ben. _Long_ time ago.” Kylo wasn’t listening, busy preventing himself from falling victim to all the emotions flooding into him. It all felt so good, so noble, so calm. He ached for it. “Remember after Jakku?” 

Weakened, Kylo humored the trooper. “I remember the Resistance pilot.” 

“And _after_ that? Right after? You sought me out. Heard I was going to be reconditioned, or sensed it, I guess. I think that’s how it works. Then you told me to get the Resistance pilot, that we were going to save him and take him back to the Resistance together.” Finn’s saber slipped a little. “But then Snoke found you.” 

“Why should I believe you?” 

“Do you feel it now? The bond? You put it there because you said it was stronger than anything Snoke could do to erase me from your mind. So, I don’t know… release or something.” 

_Or something._ The trooper made it all sound so easy, so believable. And the trooper knew too much. He couldn’t imagine revealing his mission to a lowly foot soldier, and he had read FN-2187’s file since his escape more often than he liked to admit. At the time, he’d thought it was a suspicious, then a justified hatred, for someone stronger than him who had used that strength to escape the vile life Kylo lived. But to think, after the past days, he had been channeling a bond he didn’t know he had possessed. Furious, Kylo sought further within himself, and when he felt a presence within himself, he released it. 

Had the light emitting the trooper been strong before, now he was the sun around which Kylo orbited. 

The memories of them meeting washed over him. 

They met once a week, on the sole day when their schedules aligned with a free slot in mid-afternoon. Since FN-2187 was prized to be promoted onto the command track once he was no longer a cadet, it was easy for Ben to schedule these moments. He was to train FN-2187, priming him for the road ahead, readying him to fall under Ben’s command. Snoke believed this would be good practice for him when the Knights of Ren congregated. 

It started like that during their first meeting, but then FN-2187 said the wrong thing—“I can’t leave them behind,” he’d said. “They’re my unit.”—and Ben felt himself growing small around the trooper. Ben still remembered the day he was shipped off planet to begin training with his uncle Luke. His father had stared stonily as he boarded the transport ship; his mother had been away in a diplomatic meeting on Naboo. Though Ben had been the one to leave, all he wanted was to go backward in time, relive that one birthday when his parents had both been home. 

Ben remembered FN-2187 defending his actions, grasping FN-2003’s hand when he fell behind. Before that moment Ben had believed with all of his convictions that he was Kylo Ren, leading his dark knights, but after FN-2187 said that, despite the fact that he stood before Snoke’s apprentice, he felt the cracks within him burst, light streaming through, and he couldn’t battle against it. Kylo Ren was strong, but Ben was weak, foolish, overwrought. Ben loved. 

The lightsaber brightened FN-2187's eyes. He should be glaring at Kylo, but his eyes were soft on the garish light, melancholic. Ben could see it now, his resistance feigning, that FN-2187 was no more, replaced by Finn. He swallowed, shaking his head, and echoed the words spoken to his father. "It's too late." 

"No. It isn't. It never will be," said Finn, eyes kind. "Ben, come with me." 

Swallowing, Ben felt his chest ache. “Han is dead because of me,” he said, and searched Finn’s face, drinking in the love he saw reflected in Finn’s eyes—as well as the crimson glow of his saber. Flinching, Ben switched off his saber, horrified at having raised it against his bond mate. 

Finn switched off his grandfather’s saber not a second later, and part of Ben’s heart leapt at the sight of him holding it. He scowled, conflicted with the memory of his hatred of Finn holding it only seconds ago. His chest heaved, and he breathed harshly from his nose, quelling a hyperventilation. 

Finn still kept his back to the tree. “Your mother wants you,” he whispered, and Ben gazed at the snow, watching it swirl from the sky and gather like dust on the ground. 

“You’re lying,” he said. 

“I’m not. Read me and you’ll know. Your parents aren’t always aware of who’s around when they’re chatting each other up. She told him to bring you home.” 

Kylo scoffed. “She’d rather—rather be anywhere but where I am.” 

Finn touched his arm, and Kylo leaned into him before jerking back, pacing off into the forest. He heard footsteps behind him—two pairs. Finn and the scavenger, which Kylo soon confirmed by feeling for her with the Force. He felt the fury brew in him, fighting to smother out Finn’s kindness, his love. But then Finn jogged around him, stopping him by gripping his upper arms. He came close, tilted his head up, catching Kylo’s downcast gaze. Kylo Ren— _Ben_ —stood defenseless against him. 

“We can take you to Luke,” said Finn. “He’ll end it. You won’t have to carry on like this. Please, Ben, come with me." 

Ben shook his head, but felt defeated. He spoke too softly for the words to convey any malice. “Why I should care about the opinion of a lowly trooper? You’re disposable.” 

Finn’s eyes glinted with moonlight, then he surged, his lips crashing into Ben’s—and Ben’s initial thought was that they’d never done this before. Not on the Finalizer where anyone could see. Even their bond had been forged while Kylo meditated alone in his isolation chamber away from Snoke. But a kiss, intimacy—if a trooper didn’t catch them, Snoke could easily extract it from his thoughts. And it would have been easy of Snoke to do so, for this kiss felt like nothing else, impossible to forget. It could have been the bond, heightening all his senses, his mundane five and his esoteric sixth, but it somehow felt so right surrendering to Finn’s touch. 

His hands shook at his side, the saber hilt clutched tightly, but he could not will himself to touch Finn. Instead, he stood pliant as Finn’s tongue flicked across his lips, opening Ben up with a groan. Finn dug his fingers into Ben’s thick black hair, tugging and sending a shudder throughout Ben. Ben didn’t know what came over him, but he bit Finn’s bottom lip, releasing him only when Finn drew away, lip pulled taut as he parted. 

Finn panted a little, smiling tentatively. 

Ben rested his forehead against Finn’s. He was so _tired_. “I can’t be a Jedi,” he said. Then he closed his eyes, ashamed of that. If he couldn’t be a Jedi, he could only be evil, or set the Force aside like his mother. He wanted neither. 

“Then don’t be,” said Finn. 

He made it sound so easy. 

“Finn,” said the scavenger, encroaching at their side, bewildered eyes whisking from Finn to Ben. 

Ben scowled, but before he could tear away, Finn grasped his hand. When Finn turned to regard the scavenger, he squeezed Ben’s hand. “Rey, I know what this looks like, but I can explain.” 

The ground shook, snow shaking off tree branches. A crevice dug deep into the earth, tearing it apart. 

Rey stared hard at the snow dusting over the precipice. “We need to go.” She regarded Finn once more, then jerked her head behind them, walking away. 

Finn turned to Ben. “The Falcon’s waiting.” 

Anxiety poured over him like acid, and every sense in him too accustomed to Snoke wanted to smite Finn for the mere suggestion of defecting. Yet after remembering Snoke’s memory tampering, Ben willed his nerves to settle down. Once he grew calm, he remembered Luke’s last words: “Your eyes and ears will save the galaxy, Ben.” He was _so tired_. When Finn tugged at his hand to escape to the Falcon, Ben stayed rooted. 

Finn frowned, flicking a look over at the cracked ground before fixing the full weight of his gaze on Ben. “We really, really need to go.” 

The ground shook beneath them, the rumbling sending both men off balance, and on instinct Ben shoved Finn back, darting after him. They rushed into the forest, narrowly missing as the ground that had once been beneath their feet cracked into an endless pit. Had Ben wanted to return to Snoke, by now it was near impossible, the ground a riddled mess of cracks, never-ending trenches with rivers of molten lava. 

Snow swirled around them, falling from the skies and upended from the ground. It caught in Finn’s hair. Transfixed, Ben pressed a thumb on Finn’s cheek, melting a snowflake. 

“If I come,” said Ben, “you’ll stay with me?” 

Finn nodded. “For as long as you’ll have me. And I’m in your head, so I’m thinking that’s forever.” 

The words warmed Ben in places that had been cold for a very long time. Ben gnawed at the corner of his lip. “Bonds can be severed.” 

Worrying lines found their way on Finn’s face, his eyes softening and wandering quickly as he took Ben in. “Are you staying with me?” 

Ben’s thumb stilled on his face. No one had once asked for that from him. 

The ground shook once more beneath them, and Ben forgot about his mission, about Snoke, about all the destruction he caused throughout the galaxy, and just as he had felt when he first met Finn, when Finn was but FN-2187, Ben felt small. He clutched Finn’s hand. “The Falcon’s waiting.” 

Finn visibly relaxed. “The Falcon’s waiting.”


End file.
